


hope your heart is strong enough

by tieduptwoships



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Hospital, Angst, Depression, Doctors & Physicians, Doctors AU, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, I almost forgot!!, Kid Fic, Louis-centric, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Minor Character Death, bc i'm lame, but it's subtle i think, harry is a pediatric surgeon, i think?? Idk of this counts but whatever, its sad, louis is a pediatric intensivist, love me pls, no smut soz, sorta - Freeform, this is like a million tropes crushed into one fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-18
Updated: 2016-05-18
Packaged: 2018-06-09 02:59:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6886702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tieduptwoships/pseuds/tieduptwoships
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Doctors AU. Louis and Harry were taught in medical school that you will not be able to save everyone but that’s just life, it happens. That doesn’t mean they’re not going to try.</p>
            </blockquote>





	hope your heart is strong enough

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Conscious_ramblings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Conscious_ramblings/gifts).



> thanks to _concious_ramblings_ for the prompt! I changed it up a little bit (or a lot??? well, okay, you gave me a lot of freedom with this prompt and I feel like I went too far but heY. Also I absolutely love your work. So much pressure writing this lol) but I hope you like what I did with it. AND I’M SO SORRY THIS IS LATE.
> 
>  **disclaimer** : i do not own any of these characters lol. anything and everything that happens in this fic is purely made up. basically.
> 
> p.s. i know nothing about being physicians but i researched as much as i could. (thanks google) obviously there are inaccuracies so i’m really sorry!
> 
> p.p.s. (is this a thing?) this is my first fic EVER. this is literally a Doctors AU + the enemies to lovers trope + angst + so many other tropes rolled into one. soz. please be nice. :( haha. thank you!
> 
>  **warnings** : blood?? hospitals?? mental illnesses (depression/anxiety) on both patients and major characters but it’s very subtle i think. LOTS OF MENTIONS OF DEATH I’M SO SORRY BUT IT’S NEVER THE MAJOR CHARACTERS. swearing and stuff. smoking? yep. medical techy stuff that even i don’t understand. should that be a warning. no smut soz. i’m the worst.
> 
> p.p.p.s.(?) this is probably really bad. sorry. :(

**CHAPTER ONE**

Louis Tomlinson was taught in medical school that giving in to your emotions and showing them are big no-no’s. The problem is that Louis has always been the kind of person who can’t exactly hide what he’s feeling and if he does, it ends up rather ugly; but he does it anyways. He hides behind a mask of seriousness and focus when faced with his job. Despite this, Louis loves his job; he really does. Sure, it isn’t exactly a pediatric intensivist that he dreamt of becoming but here he is now. He loves children and being able to to help people. But his job also comes with hard jabs like little to no sleep and failures, and he’s only human, so can they really blame him for hiding in the emergency stairwell after their last surgery this afternoon didn’t turn out too well? Maybe he even cried a little bit but no one has to know that.

His day started like any other: wake up - check emails and messages while having a cuppa - run - shower - breakfast - pass by the corner cafe to grab Liam breakfast - drive to work. He’s at Saint Anne’s Children’s Hospital’s PICU doors by 6:30, ready to make rounds and see his patients, having dropped off Liam’s coffee at his office a floor above. Getting called to remember to prep for a surgery as soon as he stepped into the unit is not a regular thing like everything else but it happens quite often too.

“Good morning, Louis,” Jesy greets from behind the reception desk, all scrubs and huge smiles. How she can be so chipper so early in the morning is beyond Louis but he smiles and greets her back nonetheless. The brown-haired nurse tells him Zayn needs him at his office as soon as possible and that’s where Louis goes. He passes by the kids’ rooms on his way and sees some of them already up; some are being treated by the other physicians and nurses, others just trying to make time pass by watching TV or playing with their toys. He makes sure to say hi to one of them—Riley O’Connor, a 7 year old girl with a brain tumor—who he finds just staring blankly towards her window where the sunlight is hitting her room just nicely. Louis smiles once she turns and sees him, and asks, “how’s my lovely Riley doing this fine morning?”

“Good morning, Lou Lou,” she giggles, blue eyes meeting blue eyes. Louis steps in to stand by her bedside and starts to twirl around his fingers her strawberry blonde hair. “I was asleep all afternoon yesterday and woke up only at 2 in the morning so it’s a little bit hard to get some sleep after that.”

“Do you need anything?” he asks, finishing the small braid on her hair. Riley is one of Louis’ favorite patients. She’s very brave and kind and funny and reminded Louis so much of one of his younger sisters.

“A hug,” she decides. She pouts and enlarges her glossy eyes, crosses her arms and looks completely fragile, sarcasm evident in her moves. Louis hugs her anyways. He loves his kids and wishes they didn’t have to be here, because being in the pediatric intensive care unit means the worst of the worst situations the kids can possibly be in, and no one deserves that no matter how much it can’t always be helped.

He’s knocking on Zayn Malik’s door not ten minutes later. Besides being department head who overlooks everything, Zayn is also the PICU’s attending pediatric cardiovascular surgeon (which Louis always thinks is A LOT of words). A child genius, he was, and head onto becoming who he is now by age 16; Louis used to be envious, but it’s been long since he wasn’t more inspired than envious. It’s still there, he guesses, but how can he not be jealous of someone who’s literally beauty and brains? Zayn’s probably the most beautiful person on Earth. Okay, not  _ probably.  _ Zayn  _ is  _ the most beautiful person in the world, maybe even the whole universe. Louis’s sure. When the doctor calls out for him to come inside, he puts his solemn mask back on and walked right in.

Louis isn’t surprised to find Harry Styles, one of the PICU’s attending pediatric surgeons, sitting on Zayn’s office couch. He doesn’t pay any attention to Louis, eyes trained on his phone. He thinks he deserves it; he doesn’t mind. Zayn eyes them carefully, knowingly, but doesn’t say anything about it. He says instead: “good morning, Louis.”

They both nod in greeting.

“Erm, just reminding you about JJ’s transplant at 2PM,” Zayn explains. “His parents are arriving in a bit. I need you to handle the information to be passed again and to just go over his papers if all the consent and legal forms are good to go.”

“Oh, went through them last night and we’re all set. Just need to talk them through the surgery again.” Louis isn’t even going to pretend that his voice didn’t break by the end of his sentence. He’d been thinking about this procedure for the last week and it may or may not have been driving him crazy.

“JJ?” Harry asks. Louis turns to find him locking his phone, attention fully in the other two’s conversation.

“Where have you been the last week, honestly?” Louis grumbles before Zayn can utter a word. Honestly, JJ’s case has been on Louis’ mind the whole week and Harry is just clueless which absolutely pisses Louis off. He waits for an answer and rolls his eyes when a shrug is all he gets. “JJ Thompson, cardiomyopathy. He’s been in the hospital for a while, was in the general ward for about a week and a half then transferred to the PICU for the last 3 weeks. We couldn’t figure out what was happening at first because he seemed normal; no swelling, nothing. Fatigue was the only present symptom and fainting once at home which was why he was admitted in the first place, ran some tests, heart failure. We’re performing the heart transplant today.”

“Oh, sorry,” Harry says with nonchalance and a shrug. “Been pretty busy this week, you know, surgeon and all.”

Louis puts both of his hands in his pockets and just rolls his eyes again. He turns back to the brown-eyed man behind the desk before he starts another argument with the surgeon and asks, “anything else?”

Zayn sends him on his way.

The day goes on; Louis makes his rounds with his patients, meets with JJ’s parents to discuss the operation one last time, and even tends to a new admission. Before he knows it, he’s entering the operating room and sanitizing before putting on his gloves and mask, ready for the surgery.

The boy’s already under a sleep spell from the anesthesia when Louis comes in following the rest of the team. The tension in the room is thick with anxiety because, even as professionals, they can’t always guarantee that everything will be perfectly fine, but everyone keeps their composure as this was their job. And it progresses well. At first.

5 hours into the transplant, Louis finds himself about to lose his mind when the boy goes into shock. The beeping monitor emits a monotonous ring and Louis looks up to a flat line. He doesn’t understand what went wrong; JJ was healthy and strong besides this problem and everyone was positive that this operation was gonna go smoothly. They were wrong. Louis doesn’t even hear the other doctors when they announce the time of death. They close up the incision on JJ’s chest and Louis doesn’t look when they’ve finished and pulled the covers over the little boy’s body. All he can think about is how JJ’ll never get the chance to see Manchester United play live anymore, just like they always talked about since the two met.

How Louis ends up crying in the emergency stairwell after all the commotion with the parents and the documents, he’s not quite sure.

He sits there for a while just letting the tears fall. He hates this: not being able to save the kids, not being able to let them live longer. He hates this part of the job because admittedly there really are cases that cannot be saved but Louis would still do whatever it takes to save them. Liam has already told him off about getting too attached to his patients but Liam doesn’t understand, is the thing. It’s so unfair. No one deserves to die, especially not little kids who have yet the chance to see the world and do things. And it’s so unfair that there’s nothing he could do to stop it from happening sometimes. He doesn’t always let himself cry like this, he’s not that weak. But sometimes it just all feels too much.

“Fuck,” he mutters to himself. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

Get a grip, Tommo. Can’t have anyone catch you breaking down in the job.”

He wipes his eyes with the ends of the sleeves of his white coat and takes a deep breath before finally, finally, walking back to his office (being one of the head intensivists in the place has its perks) and plopping down his chair. If it was Harry he saw with apologetic eyes and a soft smile before he walked into his room and plopped down his chair, he doesn’t care enough to know what the boy wanted to say. The clock reads 11PM and Louis is so ready to go home and fall on his bed and just… not think anymore.

✿

When Louis walks into intensive care at 7AM the next day, he finds Riley manning the front desk with his other best mate, Niall Horan, who both greet Louis with gigantic smiles on their faces. He can’t help but mimic their actions. Niall and Riley grin at each other and simultaneously take a deep breath before exclaiming ‘good morning Lou!’ Louis laughs. It was tough going to sleep the night before but coming into work to this has turned Louis’ mood around instantly. 

“Good morning,” he says, laughing. “How are you guys even so bouncy this time in the morning?”

Niall high-fives him and the strawberry-blonde kid copies the action excitedly. “It’s tough getting this little girl to sleep. Nothing but a big pain in the arse, if you ask me.”

“Language!” Louis reprimands at the same time the little girl giggles saying, “You’re the pain in the arse!”

Everyone by the nurse’s station just behind the front desk laughs. Louis lights up at the way Riley just beams with joy after making everyone smile. She’s the best, Louis thinks. She may have a chronic illness slowly eating her up inside but she fights like a champ and never fails to make anyone and everyone around her smile, wherever she is. She raises her eyebrows at Louis and questions his 30-minute tardiness. Louis’ smile drops just a little bit.

He spent the last night twisting and turning in bed but eventually, he fell asleep around 2AM. His alarm woke him up at 4 and he hadn’t a choice but to get up if he wanted to turn in at work on time, so he got up and went on his usual routine: run-shower-cafe-drive-hospital. He even got there early but knowing Liam was already there by 5 in the morning, Louis decided to hang out in his friend’s office for a little while first. It was quiet because Louis wasn’t up for talking and Liam understood. They played basketball on the little hoop Louis got the other doctor for Christmas last year and Louis’s just incredibly grateful for Liam. He could kiss the lad, honestly. It’s times like these that he remembers to appreciate those who stick around in his life.

“Talking about it helps,” Liam told him with a shrug, right before he made a shot. And of course he said that, he’s a psychiatrist, of course. Louis didn’t and doesn’t want to talk about it, is the problem. He doesn’t want to be seen as a weak doctor who lets his emotions get the best of him at his worst times. No one has to know that too. Louis just shrugged and took his turn to shoot the ball. He missed but he’s always been the footie kind of lad anyways.

“Maybe,” he said but he’s learned well enough in the last 8 years that forgetting whatever he felt in that operating room yesterday, just like any other failures, he needs to learn to forget somehow (or at least push to the very back of his mind). He’s learned well enough that he only gets the night to find solace and remind himself that bad things happen in his job and he shouldn’t let it get to him; that as soon as he steps into work the day after a hard blow, he needs to have his facade repaired and his feelings stowed away lest it come in the way with treating other or future patients.

They talk about patients instead. They recollect the moments they felt proud to be doing what they do, and remember the funny patients they’ve met. They talk about everything but Louis and he’s grateful until surprisingly (but not really) the conversation drifts to Harry.

“He’s such an arse, honestly. Thinks he’s better than everyone,” Louis complains, arms crossed and brows knitted together.

“Why do you say that? He’s nothing but kind and wonderful if you ask me. I gave you the benefit of the doubt before but watching him closely, there’s really nothing wrong with the kid,” Liam defends.

“He’s a wonderkid getting glorified for every little thing that he does just because he’s young and fresh or some shit,” Louis explains in a huff as he shifts in his seat across Liam’s desk. He knows Liam’s probably worried by the way he’s been staring at the basketball hoop for the last five minutes but he feels like he’ll break if he looks Liam in the eyes.

“So you’re jealous, that’s what it is?”

“Pffft. Jealous? I’m good and contented in my job. I don’t do it to be glorified.”

“Then what is the problem with Harry? Ever since he came here, all you did was fight with him and nobody even understands why.”

Louis groans. He doesn’t know why this conversation is even happening or why he has to go through these emotions with Harry again and he’s wonderfully pissed off.

Liam looks at him accusingly. “Cut him some slack. Stop messing with him too. He’s just doing his job too. How do you know he doesn’t just do it because he loves what he’s doing? How do you know he even likes being praised for every  _ little  _ thing he does?”

Louis shrugs. “Oh please. He knew what he got himself into when he pursued this path at a young age. Plus, he has it easy, has everyone wrapped ‘round his fingers. He can use the extra push.”

“I just don’t understand why you hate him so much. He hasn’t even done anything to you.”

“You have no idea,” he mutters loud enough that Liam knows he said something cruel but softly enough that Liam doesn’t know what he said exactly, but when Liam asks him to speak up he says instead: “I don’t  _ hate  _ him, Lima. I don’t know him well enough to care about and hate him. I don’t see the point of him and his curly hair and his gigantic hands and, whatever. Just. I don’t care.”

The thing is that Harry’s the sort of pretty face and charm (not to mention brains) that goes viral on the internet. A 16 year old girl he had looked after once before he moved into Louis’ hospital tweeted about him being the most attractive doctor in the world and the shit exploded all over the web in less than 24 hours. He was even invited to Ellen! It never actually happened as his schedule as a PICU doctor was hectic but  _ he was invited to Ellen. In America. For being some attractive wonderkid.  _ When Harry moved to St. Anne’s, he was the talk of the town and everyone loved him from his first day. His patients and everyone who’s stepped foot in the department absolutely adored him and Louis didn’t understand the whole craze; just another bloody handsome doctor who probably just worked his way through his career with his charm and his way with people. Okay, he probably deserves the praise for starting med school at 17 or whatever and being successful. Louis can admit as much, but it doesn’t make matters any better. Call it a petty reason to dislike someone, but Louis takes his job seriously and people who don’t just frustrate him.

And maybe Louis had a past with Harry that he doesn’t want to go back to or bring up ever again but no one has to know about that. So he pretends it’s all new to him too.

“Are you into him? Is that it because-”

“NO, Liam. I’m not into him. I don’t see the point of him and why everyone’s treating him like some prince, end of discussion.”

The rest of the day passes by like a blur with all the patients Louis gets busy with. He finds himself on the rooftop of the place at exactly 4 in the afternoon, funny that. He takes a deep drag on his cigarette and takes in his surroundings. The sun is just about to set and it’s creating a beautiful mixture of pinks, oranges, and purples in the sky making everything look so… soft yet powerful. It’s magical, the sunset. Everything looks pretty and gentle and like nothing can go wrong. It’s what he feels around his kids all the time: soft, gentle, and calm, but also full of the urge to protect them from any harm that comes their way, to make sure nothing goes wrong.

“Louis,” a deep but gentle voice calls from behind him. Louis has always found it funny how the boy speaks so slow but it also adds to the gentleness, he thinks, which Louis thinks is nice. But the gentleness disappears when, “how many times are we doing this every month, Louis? Seriously?”

Louis lets the smoke out in an exhale and rolls his eyes. He doesn’t need this right now. He can’t believe he just thought of Harry in a nice way. He turns around and calls back, “fuck off.”

“You’re smoking in a bloody hospital, need I remind you,” Harry continues, frustration evident in his voice, hand running through his long brown curly hair. His fucking hair. “Where you have patients with lung problems who just want the illnesses to stop destroying them and here you are asking for it? What kind of doctor smokes in a hospital? Or smokes at all, really?”

“Why the fuck do you care, Harry?” He turns to face Harry who is standing by the door looking like Louis just ran over a puppy or something, and Harry groans in agitation. “You know what, Louis? Fuck you.”

Louis flinches. He wants to feel angry because that’s the first time Harry’s dared to yell at him the way he did just then, but he doesn’t. Harry never yelled. Harry’s peace and kindness and love and flowers inside the lanky yet muscular body. Louis isn’t too blinded by his opinion of the boy to not see what kind of person Harry is, especially when you work so close together almost 24/7, especially considering he actually knew this boy years and years before. The younger boy walks away, then, only to return to a still-staring nonplussed Louis, as if he just remembered why he went there in the first place. He avoids Louis’ gaze and stares at the sky behind Louis’ head.

“I didn’t mean to yell, I’m sorry,” Harry starts, shifting his weight from one leg to another and then back, discomfort fully present in his stance. There’s the Harry that Louis knew, incapable of hurting other people, at least he thought so before all went to shit between them. “Riley wants you in her room. She asked me to tell you to come ASAP. Get rid of the cigarette smell and see her please.”

Louis wants to laugh, then, remembering the moment Harry last walked away from him all those years ago. His hair was definitely shorter back then. It didn’t quite reach the middle of his back the way it does now.

Louis considers to deny him for a moment but he’s not going to deny Riley just to spite Harry so he follows. He remembers when he was 17 and Harry was 15 and all was well and happy; but his memories are quickly clouded by more recent pictures of the two of them in arguments. Arguments that went from something as huge as a case or something as stupid as who gets the last mug in the pantry during that one day they both just happened to leave their own mugs at home. It’s stupid really. He tries to arrange his thoughts and discards his cigarette before following Harry down.

He does as told: he gets rid of his shirt and gets into a new one; he retrieves his coat from his office and sprays on perfume for extra measure; he rinses his mouth and chews on some mints too. He’s by Riley’s door in 30 minutes. It’s almost like habit. It’s growing into a bad habit. The more stressed he gets, the worse his smoking gets. He used to have better control over his stress and habits; he shrugs that thought off. He stops when he sees Harry and Riley through the sliver of glass not covered by the curtains. He can hear Riley’s laughter and smiles to himself. She only deserves good things, he thinks at that moment. Harry spots him at the door and their eyes meet for a second before Riley’s rushing off the bed to jump into Louis’ arms, who gladly takes her and bounces her around, both of them smiling like they haven’t seen each other in a long time. (Is 8 hours long enough?)

“Boo bear!” Riley laughs as Louis drops her back to bed and tickles her sides. “How’s my favorite patient doing?”

“Oh please, you say that to everyone,” Riley says with a smirk and a roll of her eyes which earns an uproarious laugh from Harry who is still standing by the door. He quickly covers his mouth and muttered a muffled “oops” when the other two catch him. “I’ll get going, sorry,” he said, cheeks red.

Louis’s relieved until the little girl stops Harry with a giggle and “please stay and play with us, Hazza. Please?”

And fuck if this girl doesn’t know just how to get everyone to do what she wants with a look and a pout. She has the whole unit wrapped around her dainty 7 year old fingers. It isn’t necessarily a bad thing, or, well, it hasn’t been a bad thing until Louis finds himself stuck with Harry who has no choice but to stay for Riley’s sake. They don’t want to make a big deal out of it, especially not in front of Riley, so Louis tries to convince himself it isn’t a bad idea. They make paper airplanes and Riley makes Louis and Harry run around her bed with an airplane in each hand while the girl tries to catch one from where she’s seated. For a moment, Louis forgets everything and he laughs and he feels  _ okay  _ again. He even questions why he still holds so much anger towards Harry after all this time when, in their little bubble, there seems to be nothing to be mad about. But like all the other times, it doesn’t last.

Both doctors’ phones start buzzing and they apologize to Riley before rushing off to one of the rooms at the far left corner of the unit where a little boy with a brain tumor, one of Louis’ patients Tommy, is having a seizure. Louis almost loses it, but he doesn’t. He keeps his composure and rushes to Niall’s side who’s running his hand across the little boy’s head, Leigh-Anne checking his vital signs. The unit’s attending neurologist rushes into the room too but Louis can’t focus. His thoughts are rampant in his head, trying to pinpoint what exactly might have gone wrong with Tommy while he checks the machines surrounding the boy’s head and giving out instructions. Everyone is talking over each other but it’s what they do and they’re used to it, only Louis’s struggling for the first time since med school to keep up.

“Get me 300 mg of his AEDs”

“Phenytoin?”

“It’s been 6 minutes”

“Doc, what’s happening?”

“I’ll get the Phenytoin”

“God, 6 minutes, this is-”

“Bad. This is bad.”

“What does bad mean? Is my son going to be okay?”

“We might need to get him into surgery,” Louis hears Harry say over the others speaking. Leigh comes back with the dosage and Niall is still soothing the boy. Louis is breathing heavily and he can feel Harry’s hand rubbing up and down his back and he takes a deep breath and turns to the mother of the boy. “He’ll be fine. We’ll do whatever we can to help him,” he reassures her and it’s almost too calm that even he wonders if it’s really him speaking.

At about 7 and a half minutes, the 9 year old stops shaking.

They slowly work out trying to bring him back and calming him. It takes them a good thirty minutes and the collective sigh in the room as soon as Tommy opens his eyes says enough about how they’re all feeling. They ask him his name and if he knows where he is and what day it is, and they laugh when he jokes that he hasn’t looked at a calendar for days, and Louis can still feel his chest heave rapidly with heavy breathing as much as he can feel Harry’s hand soothing his back. Harry clears his throat and assures the boy’s mom that it’s going to be fine.

 

Louis excuses himself as soon as all plans are final and they’ve made sure Tommy is feeling alright. His breaths have slowed but he feels like exploding, like he’s trapped and he grabs his hair and discreetly pulls in an attempt to maybe wake himself up. He wants to scream and he almost hits Harry in the face with his fist when he taps on his shoulder from behind and Louis just really wants to scream. He feels like he’s underwater and he can’t breathe and he can’t remember anything he’s learned from medical school and Harry is suddenly holding him and his thoughts are still rampant and he pushes him away and makes his way to Liam while trying not to look like he’s dying. He doesn’t know if he’s imagining it when Harry asks if he’s okay and calls after him. He doesn’t know if he imagined answering “no, I’m not.”

**CHAPTER TWO**

Harry Styles was taught in medical school that you will make mistakes but it’s okay, it happens. He figures it’s a general life thing but it was med school that got it stuck in his head.

It doesn’t help, though, when they realized Tommy has been diagnosed with the wrong illness and because of that, they lost him. It wasn’t wrong, per se, as most of the symptoms and conditions pointed to that diagnosis; but it wasn’t exactly right either, especially when in the middle of a surgery, the boy wasn’t strong enough to handle the situation and in reviewing what happened, they learned that they missed a symptom that affected the whole procedure. Harry doesn’t see how mistakes are okay. Not in hospitals where it’s literally a matter of life and death.

10 years of doing surgery doesn’t teach you to get used to deaths and failures. They lied. There’s no getting used to it. Only acceptance and moving on.

He’s angry. He doesn’t know with whom or with what, but he’s just so angry. So he goes off to do what usually makes him not angry: seeing the kids.

He spends his day going around the PICU to talk to the children and their families, to see if he can help in any way. It gets his mind off his own problems, trying to help others with theirs. Maybe that isn’t a healthy way of doing it but  _ fuck it  _ .

He ends up outside Riley’s room when he hears her giggling over one of the nurses’, Jade’s, sweet voice singing “ _ you can be beautiful, wonderful, anything you wanna be, little me.  _ ”

Harry’s heart melts as he leans on the wall, smiling. Riley’s a gem. He wishes he can do more than  _ be there  _ for her but alas, that’s the best he can offer. Jade walks out the room and offers him a small smile as she walks past him. He’s about to enter when he hears another voice speak up.

Louis.

A peek into the small sliver of window uncovered by the curtains gives Harry his answer.

Soft yellow fairy lights illuminate the room and in the middle lies Riley in a hospital gown on her hospital bed, and Harry has to stop himself from cooing. Even with a cannula around her head, and no hair left from radiation? She shines like the sun. Louis is standing beside her, her hand in his. He’s telling her something Harry can’t quite hear so he carefully moves to stand by the door. He doesn’t mean to eavesdrop, really, but he can’t help but watch the two. Louis may treat Harry like shit most of the time and Harry may not be happy with Louis either, but he still knows how much it takes to make Louis smile, so actually seeing him smile left Harry at ease. Their memories together isn’t something he likes to go back to but the many years from now since then taught Harry to let it go. He doesn’t want to think about it so he tunes back into the conversation.

“You can’t tell anyone okay? But you wanna know why you’re my favorite girl?” he hears Louis say softly and chuckle.

“Why?” Riley asks with a small smile and Harry instantly knows something’s wrong or she would’ve called out Louis for calling her his favorite. He knows Louis does too when: “are you okay, darling?”

She sighs like she’s torn between wanting and not wanting to talk about whatever’s bothering her, but she gives in after a moment. “Am I gonna be like Tommy, Lou?” she asks and Harry can see the tears forming in her eyes even from where he’s standing.

Harry watches on as Louis’ back tenses a little but he regains composure as quickly as he lost it. Harry feels the ache in his chest as well. He can’t help but blame himself. He made a mistake and it caused the loss of a child’s life and he’s going to have to live with it. They don’t really know, is the thing. There really isn’t knowing whether someone is going to be okay or not most of the time, especially not in intensive care. He’s well aware, along with the rest of the PICU staff, that Riley and Tommy had a special friendship brought upon by being in the unit for a long time together, and he knows how protective Louis is of these kids. He hears Louis let out a sigh himself before he responds.

“Sweetheart, I promise to do everything in my power to protect you, okay?” he promises to the little girl and Harry involuntarily nods in agreement. “You’ve got me and Hazza--” Harry flinches at the nickname coming from Louis--“and Zayn and Niall and Li and Jade and everyone else in this floor and we’re going to protect you, yeah? Tommy… The universe just wanted Tommy’s pain to end so he can be happy again without anything hurting. We’re doing our best, love, I promise. But what I can’t promise is that it’s not gonna be hard for any or all of us. I’m sorry.”

She only nods. Tears are falling from Riley’s eyes and Harry feels weak.  _ It’s all my fault,  _ he thinks. Harry doesn’t realize Louis’s crying too until: “are you okay boobear?”

Louis laughs at the nickname. Harry smiles in recognition, although his probably shown not just happiness but pain and guilt and everything else all at once. Louis plays with the little girl’s fingers, opens and closes his fist around Riley’s, and assures her with, “I am. I’m glad he’s safe now.”

“You’re the best doctor ever, Lou,” she chuckles and then whispers, “don’t tell Zaynie I said that.”

Louis’ laughter booms around the room and he thanks her for thinking that. Harry doesn’t move away but he zones out and doesn’t hear the rest of the conversation, thinking about Tommy that morning, until:

“I’m sorry,” Louis says simply. Harry doesn’t get it immediately and then he does, and it hurts all over again.

“It’s okay,” she says. She turns to face Louis, then, and cups his cheeks in her tiny hands. She giggles and Harry is so mad that this beautiful little girl has to go through all this pain; that anyone at all has to go through all this. “When I die, I want to-”

“Hey, who said anything about dying? Why are you thinking about this, sweetheart?”

“It just feels like it sometimes, Lou Lou. I want to get better. For mum, for dad. For you and Hazza. For Ni, and Jade, and nurse Jesy, and nurse Perrie, and Leigh, and Lima, and Zaynie, and Tommy… I want to get better for everyone. But I’m only this many”—she holds up six fingers—“and I can only do so much and sometimes it makes me tired and sad and sometimes I just wish it stops already. Is that bad, Louis?

I know you work really hard but what if I’m really just meant to go soon? And I thought, maybe if I’m gone, you get more rest time and so does everyone else. Mum and dad don’t have to work overtime or extra shifts, they can just go home and be together. You aren’t going to be scared for me anymore because you’ll know I’m safe in heaven. It will be easier. I don’t have to feel so much pain.”

Riley looks up when Harry sniffles and he realizes he’s been caught. The little girl smiles and greets him with tired eyes, tears still spilling from beautiful baby blues. The other doctor quickly looks up from where he’s sitting, back facing the door where Harry stands, and wipes his tears away.

“You can always just knock and come in instead of always standing there like a stalker,” Louis jokes while wiping the tears from Riley’s cheeks; both of them giggling. Their smiles don’t reach their ears though.

“Sorry,” Harry quickly murmurs. “I didn’t mean to stay and eavesdrop. That wasn’t my inten-”

“Hey, it’s okay,” Louis says before he can finish. “Come in.”

And  _ okay  _ , Harry thinks, stunned. This is the first time they’re in the same room that’s just the two of them and they’re not arguing. He slowly makes his way to the bedside and wonders what it’s like to be so young and to have to endure all of the pain and hardships this comes with. It hurts him that he probably will never completely understand but he’s trying his best. It  _ is  _ his job. They don’t tell her she’s wrong for thinking what she did or that it’s better to keep fighting because Harry knows, and he supposes Louis feels the same, that the outcome isn’t really something they can be sure and upfront about all the time. Instead, Harry takes a seat beside the other two while Louis shifts to lie down on the other side of the girl and holds her in his arms. Harry watches with fond as Louis kisses Riley’s temples and whispers her words of encouragement. They can’t promise it’ll be better but Harry hopes the promise of them never leaving her side will be enough for now. Louis reminds her how beautiful and strong and brave she is. She smiles and Harry… Harry is going to do everything for this girl to always have that smile on her face. She looks up at him as if she can hear his thoughts.

“Will you hug me too, Hazza?” she asks, a grin now plastered on her face from all the love she’s getting. Harry’s not going to say no to that. It feels strange to be huddled up with Louis when they’ve never really seen eye to eye since he came here but Harry hopes this actually means something. That this and when he held onto Louis during his anxiety attack the other day (if he even remembers) means they can start over. He lets go and lets Louis hold onto Riley until she falls asleep while Harry moves himself to the couch.

✿

It didn’t mean anything. Or at least, Louis’s acting like it didn’t mean anything, and it shouldn’t be bothering Harry but it does, and he hates it.

Harry joins the morning rounds with Louis and the rest of the team and Louis hardly spares a glance at Harry. Nothing but a cold shoulder, not even a smile, so he shrugs it off and goes on his way for his own tasks.

“Why did I have to end up at the same hospital as Louis Tomlinson?  _ Why?  _ ” he groans as soon as he enters Zayn’s office and flops down onto the couch. Zayn only stares at him funnily, one eyebrow arched and a smirk on his face. It doesn’t help.

“This little crush doesn’t seem so little anymore, huh?” Zayn teases with a chuckle, going back to the paperwork on his desk.

“Piss off. I told you never to bring it up. And I don’t have a  _ crush  _ on him. Whatever’s between me and Louis was a decade ago so, whatever,” he explains rather hopelessly.

When Zayn finally sighs and closes the folder full of papers in front of him, attention fully on his best mate, Harry’s mood lightens a little bit. What’s great about his and Zayn’s friendship is that they were both child geniuses that ultimately chose a career at a very young age that is multiple levels of complicated, so they understand each other in a way when it came to their experiences.

“Why don’t you two just talk about it and finally get some sort of closure? You said so yourself, it’s been a decade. You won’t even tell me what happened, clearly you haven’t really moved on,” Zayn says. Harry scoffs. As if it’s that easy to  _ just talk about it. _

“We were kids, it doesn’t matter,” he tries to assure Zayn but he knows he falls short.

“You were just kids so it doesn’t matter? You both act as if the other is toxic and you want nothing to do with each other, but at the same time there’s so much sexual tension and electricity between you two that-”

“What are you on about?” Harry cuts him off, and he knows Zayn can hear the frustration in his voice.

“Tell me what happened and I’ll help you, or you figure it out on your own. Go talk to him and fix it.”  _ No way in hell. _

“I don’t want to talk about it. It’s not important,” Harry repeats through gritted teeth.  _ When is this conversation ending?  _ He tries to shake the tension off his shoulders by shrugging and relaxing and shifting in his position on the couch.

“Fuck it’s not important,” Zayn hisses. Harry knows Zayn is probably right but he’s not going to tell him that, nor is he planning on admitting it out loud even to himself.

“Louis gave up on me when I chose to pursue something  _ I  _ wanted for myself. You shouldn’t be with someone who’s going to hold you back from your dreams but he did hold me back and so I left,” Harry explains, voice weak and shaky from discomfort and because of the memories coming back.

“Harry. I didn’t-” Zayn tries to say but Harry doesn’t want to hear it.

“It’s fine. I don’t want to talk about it.”

Harry gets up to leave without another word. He was shocked, to say the least, to find Louis in the same hospital and the same unit when he moved here. He really tried to keep things civil but sometimes, he couldn’t help but still feel pained from his and Louis’ past. Growing up together only to break things off when they finally thought it could be a forever thing took its toll on Harry. It isn’t something he likes to relive in his mind but being with Louis almost every hour of every day makes it kind of hard. He shoves all of it to the back of his mind as he makes his way to have lunch alone before he has to get ready for another operation. He puts his long curly hair in a bun as he heads downstairs and outside to look for somewhere to grab some lunch.

He gets distracted with work for the rest of the afternoon. He never really wanted to become a doctor; he wanted to be a photographer, but his whole family from his great great great grandparents, or something like that, until his own parents and older sister pursued medicine and he didn’t really have much of a choice. It doesn’t mean he doesn’t like what he’s doing though. 3 years into medical school and he realized he actually wanted to be a physician too. He thought about all the good he can do, all the people he can help, and it all felt worth it. Not to mention he was barely 20 at the time, but he easily figure out that, yes,  _ this is what I’m meant to do.  _ He didn’t just do well, he did great. He was a child genius (not to brag) that was offered a spot in a medical school in the United States at the age of 17, great things were expected of him, and great things he delivered.

It’s really all about helping people. Harry has always wanted to make a mark in the world, be someone of importance, and maybe he’s not that for the whole world but just knowing he’s important to one or a couple of people, that he’s made a mark on someone’s life is good enough for him. There are bad days, yes, but there will always be more good days than bad. This isn’t something you can control. He knows he’s the one thing in his life he can control, so that’s how he sees the world, how he goes on in life: see the good in everything and everyone. He smiles at the thought of being able to save someone, change their life, take care of them, or even the little things like  _ being there _ when they need a hand.

He thinks about what a great job he has been privileged to do as he goes to check on his patients in post-op. His troubles go away for a little bit when he’s around the kids. He needs all the energy and strength when faced with his patients and their families because, while doctors have been trained well to do the procedures and tasks that they do, there really isn’t always a guarantee that everything will turn out just fine. But Harry pushes that thought away and focuses on the objective at hand.

He comes back to the PICU to check on one of his patients that has just been transferred from post-op. She’s only 5 but she’s been through so much in her life. She was born premature with several problems all over her body from her heart to her lungs and quite a few else. Sophie, her name is, fought hard through it all and it’s very humbling. Harry’s so proud of her. She’s been in and out of the hospital since she was born and as worrying as it gets sometimes, Harry’s nothing but enthusiastic and positive about her, especially now that she only keeps getting better and better. His visit to Sophie immediately put himself at ease. He loves his job.

In a strange turn of events, Harry finds himself outside Liam Payne’s office late that evening, his last surgery having gone smoothly and quickly. Zayn had called for him for a favor to send Liam something and he didn’t mean to eavesdrop on yet another of Louis’ private conversations but… Okay, he doesn’t really have an excuse, but he can’t get himself to walk away either. Especially not after: “You just rushed into my clinic having another anxiety attack… Lou, what’s on your mind?”

Harry stands by the door and prays to God that he doesn’t get caught but he’s worried now. He hears Louis chuckle, as if what Liam said wasn’t a problem at all, and say, “I don’t know. A lot?”

The air conditioning hums lowly around them inside the brightly lit office and Liam finally sighs. “This has been going on for months now, Louis, and now you’re even getting panic attacks and-”

“This is the last time.”

“No, you don’t know that. But what I do know is that 1 in every 10 doctors get depression in their time in the job and that I’m scared you-”

“Oh, for God’s sake Li, I’m not depressed! I just had a bad day because I remembered JJ and Tommy and I panicked, okay?”

Maybe Harry flinches from remembering that they lost JJ and then Tommy in a span of a few days, maybe it’s from not realizing sooner what Liam just said. To his defense, Harry isn’t as close to Louis as Liam is but he spends his working days orbiting around Louis that he feels guilty for not noticing.

“Let me finish. God, Lou. I get that but you say that all the time,” Liam says, and Harry tunes back in. Harry chances a peek into the room and sees Liam shake his head then move to sit beside Louis on the couch who curls into Liam as soon as Liam is seated. Liam wraps his arm around the smaller boy and Harry can’t help but feel even guiltier for watching something that private. Liam continues, “we’ve always been taught we aren’t supposed to show emotions in the job, especially sadness and anger, grief, all the bad things. But if you keep everything inside, it’s just going to eat you alive. I’m scared that if it is depression, it’s going to ruin your life. You have me to talk to and not just as your doctor but as your friend, yeah?”

“I’m not depressed, Li. Death is part of the job, I can take it.”

“I’m not saying you aren’t strong,” Liam starts more softly. “You are. I know you are. But I see the way you break every time you feel like you’ve failed and you lose a patient. It reminds you of her, doesn’t it? S’why you’re even a doctor in the first place, to make sure it doesn’t happen to anyone else. But it doesn’t work that way, Louis, you know that.”

Louis cries. He cries but he doesn’t fully let go still. He doesn’t sob. Harry watches as Louis lets the tears fall and his breath hitch and his body fall on Liam’s who holds him while he lets himself break. Harry decides he’s seen enough and walks away. When Zayn catches up with him and asks why he still has Liam’s file and why he looks so sullen, he lies and says he’s fine.

He remembers who  _ she  _ is and exactly what Liam was talking about. Harry doesn’t understand if this is just fate and the universe testing him for bringing Louis back into his life or because it’s meant to actually help them. He doesn’t dwell on it for too long.

✿

The sun is almost setting when Harry reaches the rooftop in search for Louis. This has become a crazy routine. He knows  _ he  _ can’t stop Louis from smoking but he tries anyway. He hates Louis for doing this to himself.

He finds Louis sitting on the edge of one of the plant boxes, cigarette between his lips, eyes closed. He looks serene but after hearing his conversation with Liam the night before (albeit it was wrong of Harry), he knows there’s so much more underneath the facade Louis tries to hide behind.

He walks towards and sits down beside Louis. He doesn’t move or open his eyes to show he’s aware of Harry’s presence but Harry sees in the way the older man’s shoulders have tensed that he  _ knows. _

“Styles,” Louis whispers in greeting after exhaling the smoke from his lungs. He still doesn’t open his eyes.

Harry takes Louis’ cigarette from between his fingers and his pack that’s lying on the other side of Louis on the plantbox without warning and walks away. He doesn’t turn back to see how Louis reacts but he definitely hears Louis tell him to fuck off.

“Fuck you,” he retorts.

✿

In yet another strange turn of events, he finds himself getting stuck with Louis everytime Riley wants company. Apparently, to her enjoyment and the boys’ dismay that it had to be the two of them, she’s “paired up her playmates so she’s never lonely” and the two really can’t say no to that.

Harry avoids Louis as much as he can because they both know that they will just end up arguing over something stupid. It’s sort of funny, if Harry’s being honest, how they manage to avoid each other in the same room where it’s just the two of them with a little girl but somehow that’s what happens for the next week.

Riley has them doing crafts or watching Disney movies that Harry absolutely enjoys. In between movies, Riley finds it right to question the two.

“Are you two okay? Are you fighting? Do you like each other?” she questions, looking at the two of them with a mischievous glint in her eyes. Harry’s reminded of how Louis was when they were kids. He pushes the thought away as soon as it came.

“WHAT?” they say in unison, disbelief in their tone. Okay,  _ what??  _ Riley eyes them in suspicion.  _ Where is this even coming from?  _ Harry wonders.

“We’re, uhm… We’re okay. Why?” he stutters, unsure what to say with Louis right there with him.

“Just because I’m only a kid, doesn’t mean I don’t know when something is wrong. Did I do something?” she asks. Harry does a double take from where he’s checking Riley’s meds to see if she’s being serious. She is.

“No, hey, it’s not your fault,” Louis says soothingly. He’s on the bed beside Riley, clearing up the mess they’ve made from cutting and pasting colored paper. He’s got a hand caressing the back of Riley’s head while his other hand reaches out to Harry to give the crumpled paper to be  thrown out. Harry keeps himself from rolling his eyes but he takes it.

“Then what’s wrong? Mum always said that if you hurt someone, you apologize and talk about it. Maybe you just need to talk about it,” Riley explains simply, the way a kid would see it. Harry sees her point. Harry  _ knows  _ she’s right. But it’s kind of a complicated matter when you’re adults. Confrontation, especially with feelings involved, is a lot harder, Harry believes.

For a while, they forget what she says, or at least Harry tries to, and no one tries to bring it up. They continue fooling around while Disney still plays in the background. In the end, they say goodbye in smiles. Funny, Harry thinks, that just because of a little girl, their actions seem to shift. He and Louis move easily around each other so suddenly that anyone wouldn’t think they’re in a long battle of emotions with each other. Harry doesn’t mind the happiness stirring inside of him though, thanks to Riley.

“Hey,” Harry hears Louis call from behind him when he walks away from Riley’s room. He stops in his tracks and turns, still unable to wipe the smile on his face until he sees that Louis isn’t smiling at all as he jogs towards Harry.

“What’s wrong?” Harry asks, concern evident in his tone.

“She’s right. We need to talk about it.”

“Not now, I guess, I mean, I have a meeting, but soon, if that’s alright?”

“Yeah.”

They don’t talk about it.

Riley notices, of course, so they get a few glares and suspicious or accusatory looks, but Harry thinks she understands that they're taking their time. Harry doesn't know why they're taking their time but he's too scared to make the first move too, so he doesn't do anything. Louis is nicer to Harry but he's extremely quieter. But they don't talk about it.

Ever since overhearing Louis’ breakdown, Harry’s senses have been turned up to maximum capacity when it came to Louis. Suddenly, he’s aware of every move Louis makes when they’re within close proximity or he can tell something is wrong just by looking into Louis’ eyes which are still awfully unreadable but somehow Harry has figured it out a bit. Suddenly, he’s memorized Louis’ typical work schedule and has managed to subconsciously match his tasks and plans to Louis’. Suddenly, Louis has consumed his every thought and maybe, although he won’t admit it out loud, Harry still cares about Louis. He’s still mad at him, but it doesn’t mean he doesn’t care.

Their relationship is still complicated, if it even counts as a relationship. A work or professional relationship maybe? Harry thinks it’s unfortunate that they aren’t friends even after 2 years of working side by side but knows he’s to blame too. That’s why it’s weird when Harry finds himself wherever Louis is most of the time. He doesn’t think anyone notices but Harry’s caught on with his mind seemingly working on its own once he’s not and doesn’t seem to be willing to let Louis out of his sight.  _ He’s worried, okay? _

They work around each other. Louis doesn’t seem to mind. This time, instead of skirting around and avoiding each other as much as possible, they actually work together and maybe that’s a good first step.

And maybe the second step is this:

“I’m sorry. We weren’t supposed to end up like this. I’m sorry for being such a bloody idiot and--”

“It’s okay,” Harry cuts him off. They're left alone in one of the hallways where Louis' just standing, looking at a file. Harry just happens to pass by, really; he isn't expecting a conversation, or anything at all from Louis. Harry breathes out in relief. He didn't want to be the one to bring this up, not with Louis' stress and possible-depression catching up to him.  _ Is it really okay?  _ he asks himself after the words tumble out of his mouth.

Louis sighs, not satisfied with Harry's answer. He closes the file in his hands and continues, “no, it’s not Haz."--Harry's breath catches in his throat because of the way Louis says his nickname that Louis first gave him--"She’s right. We need to talk about it. You chose to leave me just like that and you’d think 10, 11, what? I don’t even remember how long it’s been, but you’d think that much time would’ve taught me to let it go and--” 

Harry doesn't mean to cut him off again but that caught him off guard and he's ready to defend himself. “You gave up on me," he accuses, pained by the thought that Louis thought,  _ thinks, _ Harry would leave him so easily when it was Louis who made it anything but. "Before I even chose to leave, you gave up on me because you said you couldn’t handle a long distance relationship before you even tried. I didn’t choose to leave you.”

“You sure as fuck didn’t ask me before you  _ chose to leave , _ ” Louis counters with a frown. Harry doesn't think he's angry even when Harry's expecting him to be. He looked more... defeated than anything. 

“So you could’ve stopped me?” 

“No,  _ fuck,  _ I wasn’t part of the decision, an important one too. The point is, you had your life figured out and you acted like I was just going to go along with… You know what? Fuck it. This is why we need to talk about it. I’m sorry, Harry. I shouldn’t have acted the way I did, but the moment you lost, you packed your bags and flew off to your dreams without a fight. And it hurt me. I’m sorry but we’re both at fault here. I’m really sorry for being such an idiot.” 

“I’m sorry, too.”

"I don't hate you," Louis says softly.

"And I don't hate you," Harry assures.

It isn't much yet but Harry feels the heavy weight on his chest disappear for the first time in a long while.

  
  
  


**CHAPTER THREE**

 

Louis was taught in medical school never to give up on anything, to keep fighting until the very end. That’s what he does.

 

While snow falls outside the PICU, inside is full of festivities despite the circumstances.

Everyone from the doctors and nurses to the patients and their families are wearing Christmas themed sweaters or hats to welcome the holidays. Louis loves December and so his spirits are on high at all times.

It’s still a week and a half until Christmas but the PICU always celebrates it early so the kids will have something to look forward to. Louis walks into the unit that day to laughter and awe from the way the place has been decorated. You’d think the staff would be too busy 24/7 but they managed to cover the place with artificial wreaths, red and green flaglets hanging on the ceiling, snowmen drawings of the kids on the doors, and a tree just beside the front desk with a couple of presents underneath. The team did a pretty great job, Louis thinks, and he’s smiling again.

He spends most of his time with Riley still. The girl’s been in and out of the ICU since she was 4 and they found a tumor in the soft tissues in her neck and it makes Louis feel terrible. They stopped the tumor from getting worse as her body responded well to the treatments but about 6 months ago, she started to relapse and they learned her body was starting to reject the treatment. She’s been in intensive care since then. On days that depression washes over her like the staff expects, Louis makes sure to spend extra time with her. They whip out a small toy keyboard or a guitar that Louis teaches her to play. When she’s too tired, he just sings to her anything she wants to hear or anything he can think of and for a while, things get better. It’s harder this time around when the cancer is making her weaker and her immune system rejects most of the medicine and chemo but the strong fighter that she is just makes Louis go on and work harder to figure out how to help her.

“You really shouldn’t be getting this attached to her, you know?” Niall warned him with a sad smile after one tough day a week ago for Riley. Louis just shrugged. They’re walking through the sky blue hallways with cartoon animals on the walls, on their way to catch an elevator to the 2nd floor. “RMS… How do you say that again?”

Louis beamed and slowly tried to enunciate the word: “rhab-do-my-o-sarcoma.”

“Right. RMS.” Niall repeated with a chuckle. But it stopped as quickly as it started. “Seriously, man. When you found out she relapsed and no one could figure out why for a while, you looked half-alive yourself. It’s our job to do these things for her, I get it, but your bond is clearly stronger than with your other patients and I just don’t want you blaming yourself if ever things don’t turn out right for Riley.”

“But it will turn out right for her,” Louis said confidently. “It will.”

Niall didn’t say anything more. He just put an arm around Louis’ shoulder as they walked to the cafeteria for a late lunch that is becoming a routine between the two along with Liam.

Lunch today isn’t any different with Niall and Liam by his side until Zayn and Harry arrives and asks to sit with the rest of the group. It goes pretty well and everyone gets along, except Louis doesn’t say much, choosing to keep to himself, but he does throw in a few laughs here and there. He’s just been bothered and grumpy for the past few days and he doesn’t even understand why. All he wants to do is lay down in bed and not think about life but it’s a good thing that his job gets him out of bed in the morning everyday. He loves his job. And so it happens that the 5 of them just hang out during lunch and Louis knows they eye him and Harry carefully but he doesn’t say anything about it. They’re fine. They haven’t exactly talked about the thing between them but they’ve been working well together and  _ not fighting  _ so Louis counts that as something.

Apparently, they’re  _ friends  _ again but with all that has happened, it still catches Louis off guard when Harry peeks into his office with a smile, all dimpled and charming, to ask him for a favor.

“You know about the surprise for the kids right?” Harry asks, looking like a floating head by the door from where Louis is seated.

“Is it really a surprise if it happens every year?”

Harry must’ve decided Louis’ answer meant an invitation to come inside so Louis watches as he makes his way to the chair across Louis on his desk and makes himself at home with a shrug and “well, most of the kids are new so it’s still always a surprise during Christmas. And besides! This year we’ve got more brilliant presents!”

Louis genuinely laughs at the boy’s enthusiasm. The surgeons and their interns are assigned for the PICU Christmas this year and they couldn’t have been more right in giving Harry the leadership role.

“Poor jack, has to be in that Santa suit all day,” Louis jokes. He goes back to the papers on his desk without seeming like he isn’t interested in the conversation. He’s just. He’s been busy, okay?

“He volunteered!” Harry defends. “Well, okay, he’s the only one who can fit in the Santa costume perfectly.”

“Fat suits exist?”

“He’s not even fat, he’s just bigger than the rest of us. And we didn’t have enough money after all the presents we got and will be getting.”

Louis laughs again and gestures for Harry to go on with a flick of his wrist. “Forget it,” he says, shaking his head. “What do you want from me?”

“Help me wrap presents,” Harry says excitedly. He’s a child, honestly. A professional pediatric surgeon but also a child at age 30.

“Here?” Louis questions. “Now?”

“Uhm… Yeah? Here? But later? After your shift? Or did you want to go home? I mean, it’s fine. It’s alright. I just thought you’d be staying late or something, I don’t know why. I can always ask Niall, though, so,” Harry blubbers on, not giving Louis any space to react. Louis chuckles.

“No, hey,” he says. He moves his hand to cover Harry’s in comfort, but decides against it after realizing what he’s about to do. “It’s fine. I mean, do you want to come to mine? My apologies as I can only offer you pizza.”

“Not much of a cook still?” Harry teases. He covers his mouth in shock as soon as the words come out of his mouth but Louis laughs to show it’s not a big deal. He shakes his head. “That’ll be just fine.”

“Meet me here when you’re done with work?” Louis asks, blue eyes to green. Harry nods and thanks Louis before he leaves the room. Louis releases a breath he didn’t realize he held.

 

✿

 

Harry comes over to Louis’ flat in a total of 3 different nights. It happens like this:

 

On the first night, they meet in Louis’ office right after their shifts just like they agreed to do.

“Did you drive here?” Louis asks.

“I did,” Harry confirms. “I’ll follow you back to yours?”

That’s what they do.

It’s an unbelievable case of awkward when they first stepped into Louis’ flat. They haven’t been a part of each other’s lives since Harry was 17 and Louis was 19, and for the last two years that they were back in each other’s lives, it was spent with more anger than any substance of a relationship. They haven’t even actually talked about their situation, what this means for them, like they promised Riley and each other all those weeks ago. They somehow keep putting it off. But Louis feels tonight is going to be the night they talk about it.

It was quiet and full of lame small talk, the first half an hour of wrapping gifts. Eventually conversation flowed normally and the gift wrapping stopped and they’re watching Doctor Who on the telly from the floor beside the couch.

It happens then:

“When you walked away that day, I knew I made a mistake,” Louis starts out of the blue. Harry looks at him with confusion at first but he gets it quickly. It’s better to get this out of the way already, Louis thinks. And okay, he just needs to know. “You were right. I was being selfish for getting angry that you made the decision to fly to America without talking to me about it first. I didn’t have any reason to be angry but I was selfish, and I’m sorry.”

Harry looks away and back to the screen where Matt Smith is still running around with Karen Gillan, but Louis knows he’s listening so he continues.

“When you walked away, I  _ knew _ I was wrong. It hurt me, yes. It sucked to know you were leaving, and to America of all places, you know? That I wasn’t going to be with you. I was scared you’ll forget about me as soon as you start med school there. I didn’t want you to tell me before you made the decision because I wanted the chance to stop you. I would never do that to you. I wanted, I guess, to make sure I was as important to you as much as you were to me. But when you decided to leave without asking me first, I just thought it meant it was easy for you to put me aside for your own sake. So, I was angry. And I gave it a day. Two days later, I came over to yours with the hope of fixing things but you were gone. You left without a fight. We never spoke again. It hurts me to this day, every time I look at you.”

Louis’ eyes are trained on the floor. He rests his head on his knee and plays with the ends of his trousers, not daring to look at Harry who’s still sitting across the floor until he speaks up to say, “I’m sorry.”

There’s really nothing else to say sometimes, Louis understands. He looks up to see Harry mirroring his position. His brows are scrunched together and his eyes are full of emotion, but his body language only screamed  _ exhausted _ .

“When we fought that day, I was blinded by my anger. I thought you were selfish, yes. I thought you were only thinking of yourself. I knew I was wrong too, for not telling you sooner, or asking you first, but I didn’t admit it to myself until years later when the anger kind of started to subside, if you know what I mean. I got home that day and told my mum I was ready to leave, the sooner the better. I was out of the country in 24 hours. I didn’t regret it, not until now, really.

I’m glad to have found you again. It sucks now, to learn it’s all a misunderstanding and we let our anger blind us from each other. And I’m really sorry, Louis, I really am.”

It was silent for a moment. Louis repeats one phrase in his head the whole time.  _ I’m glad to have found you again _ .

They work out every missing piece in between. They recall memories that were created by the anger and hurt from that time. They fix loose ends and end the conversation like two friends catching up after not seeing each other for a while, which is partly true for them, except they spent most of the years from doomsday until recently with pain in their hearts.

 

On the second night, a few days after the first, Harry brings up Louis’ birthday.

“It’s your birthday tomorrow, isn’t it?” Harry asks from Louis’ kitchen as he washes off the glue on his hands.

“Not telling you,” Louis’ quick to respond from his seat on the living room. He’s just finished clearing up the table from all the clutter they made from wrapping presents and is now eating popcorn off a large bowl while Tangled plays on the telly, as per Harry’s request. He laughs. “Stalker.”

“ _ Am not! _ Well, it’s not like I’d forgotten, I just asked to open the conversation, thank you very much.” He sits down beside Louis on the couch and fake passes out from exhaustion.  _ The physician life. _ “What are you doing tomorrow?”

“Working, you know? I’m a doctor? It’s a busy lifestyle. Don’t get a lot of days off.”

Harry throws popcorn at him. “Let’s have dinner. I can cook for you here or we can look for a nice place, maybe. What do you say?”

“Why?” Louis doesn’t mean for it to come off as spiteful so he clears it up when he sees Harry look hurt. “I mean, why do you want to take me on a birthday dinner?”

“Because… Because, isn’t that what friends do?”

_ Right, friends.  _ Louis remembers the whole situation then and decides to turn to banter. “Oh?” he says with a smirk. “It isn’t a date then?”

Harry turns very red.

 

On the third night, Louis turns 32.

“Louuuu!” Harry calls from the other side of the nurse station with a huge dimpled grin, opposite Louis who’s busy with more paperwork.  _ Those dimples, honestly. _

“Patient,” Louis reminds the other simply, smiling. “Meet you later as soon as I finish?”

“Yeah, take your time,” Harry replies, still unbelievably smiling from ear to ear.

“So was this some sort of enemies to lovers thing?” Niall asks with his Irish accent sounding funny when he giggles in between words, looking at both of them from where he’s standing in the middle of the station.

“We’re not lovers,” Louis says at the same time Harry says, “we weren’t enemies?”

“That’s right,” Niall reprimands. “Liars are what you are.”

They all laugh it off.

“I’m 22. That cake is wrong,” he accuses with a pout once they’re at Louis’ flat and they’ve had dinner. He doesn’t like the thought of getting older, not even until now that he’s way past having a quarter life crisis and has just decided that his life is actually an ongoing crisis. He mutters a few curses.  _ He’s a year older again. _

“Whatever helps you sleep at night, love,” Harry says with a wink as he lights the candles on the chocolate velvet cake. They had a lovely dinner that Louis mostly did himself when he realized how shitty it was to just watch Harry cook  _ for him  _ on  _ his  _ birthday in  _ his  _ flat. Harry walked him through it and it turned out just fine. All the banter was fun too, and Louis’s grateful for having Harry back in his life. He told Harry as much.

 

✿

 

It’s 6AM on a Sunday, just a few days after his birthday and Christmas, when Louis wakes up to his ringtone blaring from his phone. He’s only supposed to come into work at 2PM on Sundays, and he doesn’t go home until Monday night so he’s supposed to be allowed to sleep in today. He groans and picks up his phone from the bedside table only to see Zayn’s name on the glowing screen. He answers with a new sense of caution and worry. Zayn doesn’t contact him directly unless it’s a really bad emergency.

“Zayn?” he says in greeting.

“I know you’re supposed to be sleeping in today,” the doctor says in a quick breath. “And I’m sorry but I need you to come in now. It’s Riley.”

The panic inside Louis grows and he’s at the PICU doors in 20 minutes with newly-washed hair ruined by the violent morning wind signalling a storm—perfect for his mood—and no coffee in hand. He doesn’t think he’s ever moved as quick as he just did. He runs to the room that’s oh so familiar and full of beautiful laughter and magic. Niall finds him standing there and points him to the radiology department where, he tells Louis, Riley is having a CT scan. Louis sprints to the elevators but when he sees they’re all too far from the 6th floor, he rushes to the stairs and runs to the 3rd floor and into building A, just 2 bridges away from him in building C. He runs and he runs and he runs.

He passes by patients and doctors and nurses and staff all milling about. It’s busy but not too busy since it’s only barely 7AM on a Sunday. He almost runs into someone and he curses but apologizes for being in a rush. He opens the doors to radiology and finds Zayn, Harry, Jade, Riley’s dad Adam, and a technician named George in one of the booths connecting to the CT scan room. Everyone looks gloomy and Louis feels like his heart could burst just from the panic.

He sees Riley on the other side of the booth, through the one-way glass. Zayn catches Louis’ eye and he shakes his head. He speaks into a microphone that you can hear through the machine. “Hey, love, good job. We’re getting you back to your room now.”

Harry and the technician walk past Louis and through the doors leading to Riley to get her out of the machine and back onto her bed. Riley’s eyes are closed but Louis can tell she’s crying. She wobbles and reaches out looking for someone to hold onto, and that’s when Louis gets it.

“Her dad woke her up when he arrived around 5AM. She thought it was too dark in the room and asked for the lights on, but her nightlights were all on,” Zayn explains slowly and Louis’s still just looking at the little girl. “She started to panic and then the pain in her head intensified. She said it was always there, like a soft hum in her head, but she didn’t think anything of it as it was easy to ignore until it got worse this morning.”

Louis stays still and Zayn takes this as a sign he’s listening. He continues, “we found a metastasis in her brain. That’s what caused her to lose her eyesight and explains the massive headache. She’s… She’s deteriorating, Lou. I don’t think—”

“No, we’ll figure it out. I know we can. We’ll think of something,” Louis assures the other doctor. Harry and Jade, along with Adam are now pushing Riley’s bed out of radiology. Louis doesn’t notice Niall’s arrival but their eyes meet once he sees the nurse, and he looks at Louis with eyes that seem to say “I’m sorry” and “I told you so” at the same time, with no malice. Louis bows his head.

“Louis, listen, please,” Zayn begs. “The tumor is encroaching on her optic nerves. Her PET scan  showed us her cancer isn’t slowing down the slightest bit. I’m sorry, Louis, but we have to shift her care from obtaining remission to just… Orchestrating her death. There’s nothing more we can do.”

When they get back to the PICU, Riley’s sound asleep from weariness and drugs. Louis goes on his day like nothing happened because that’s what they do. He does rounds and hangs out with the kids, he sees Liam like he does everyday, he studies and fills up papers. You’re not allowed to stop in this job because sickness doesn’t just stop. The cancer doesn’t wait for a doctor, a heart doesn’t wait for the body to be sent to a hospital before it fails, you just can’t stop. Sometimes the patient doesn’t even get a final breath like they do in movies where they leave their last words purposefully before they finally go. They just go. He goes on his rounds to see everyone even though the other doctors have probably just checked on some of the kids. He doesn’t think about Riley and he smiles and laughs with the kids because that’s his job and this is what he loves—making the kids smile, saving them in any way they can be saved. There’s nothing he can do about it anyways. It’s not as if the kids are just going to magically stop falling ill. But even though Louis’s well aware of that, of course it still hurts; it hurts how much death certificates he has to and will sign, hurts to know he can’t actually save everyone.

 

✿

 

Louis calls his mum while on a smoke break that afternoon because he doesn’t know anyone else who can help him through this. The longer the dial tone sounds off, the more anxious Louis gets. She answers on the 7th ring. “Sorry love, I was driving. How’s my boo bear?”

He smiles at that. “Sorry to bother you,” he says and he hears Jay scoff. “It’s… I don’t know… Riley’s…”

“Oh, sweetheart. Let it out, I’m listening.” Louis does. He tells her what’s happened to Riley and JJ and Tommy and he tells her Liam’s been great help even when he’s not actually letting Liam help the way Liam wants to help. He tells her he misses her and the girls, and how he promises to visit soon. His mum laughs at that and tells him they miss him too. Louis takes another drag of his cigarette while he listens to his mum talk about her younger siblings. He hasn’t been able to visit in about a year and a half because of his busy schedule and he feels very much like shite about it. He loves his family and it hurts him to always be away but everyone understands the job and he’s glad.  Thanks to technology, they’re able to talk a lot still. The girls send him photos and selfies almost everyday and it’s the cutest thing in the world. They facetime on important days that Louis can’t be around on. The downside still is missing one person, and he says it out loud.“I miss Lottie,” he finally says after she finishes her story about how home is. He hears her sigh through the line. “Is that what this is about Lou?”

“Maybe,” he mutters. He can hear Jay sniffling; she must be tearing up.

“You have to learn to let go, love, you know that right?” she asks.

“I know, it’s just. I just lost a patient and I have Riley who reminds me so much of Lots, and coming to the hospital is so hard these days. Riley’s barely holding on. She’s still okay, technically, but she wouldn’t even be here if they admitted her a day late. I see and talk to Riley every single day and it hurts so much to be reminded of Lottie that way and to know at the same time that one of these days I’m going to lose Riley too—maybe tomorrow, maybe in a few more months if we’re lucky with the medication—but one way or another, the cancer’s going to be too hard to stop and I just can’t handle knowing I can’t save Riles the same way they couldn’t save Lottie.”

“You have to remember that you won’t always win against the diseases, love,” Jay muses sadly. “I know how hard you work and study, how hard all doctors work and study. It’s not your fault. It’s never your fault. Your job isn’t to delay or stop death from coming because that’s life, sweetheart. It’s unfair but it’s life. Make her happy, make every day special for her, might her days end soon or very much later. Be strong together. Find happiness together. And not just her, all of your other patients, too. Maybe they don’t have a timeline the same as Riley’s but you make their stay around the PICU worthwhile anyways, so they don’t ever feel scared again, so they understand they’re being looked after.

Don’t let Lottie’s situation hold you back, she’d hate it.” They both laugh at that. Louis is starting to get emotional that he has to put the phone down on one of the taller plantboxes and the call on speaker. “Be the great big brother you were to Lots when she needed it the most to your kids there. I was so so proud of you, you know? You were so strong for everyone. You still are, Lou. And I’m still so so proud. When the cancer took Lottie from us all those years ago, you told me you wanted to become a doctor and help people, and that you’ll make sure no one else had to go through what we as a family did. I didn’t have the heart to tell you back then that you can’t really save everyone but that it’s okay. The most you can do sometimes is be there for support and love and care. It’s not your job to stop death from coming but you have the power to let these kids still have amazing lives.”

“I love you, mum,” he hums softly to which she says, “and I love you.”

The call doesn’t last very long after that, but still long enough for Louis to talk about happier lighter things and say a quick hello to his sisters Fizzy and the twins. He’s halfway through his 2nd cigarette when he ends the call and wipes his eyes. He tells himself to get a grip and be strong and  _ just bloody listen to your mum because she’s right _ .

He fights the urge to punch the nearest wall and is about to lose when Harry shows up at the door with a sense of frustration and urgency on his face.

“Can you give me shit about my smoking habits tomorrow or on another day instead? My day’s been awful enough and I won’t be coming home ‘til tomorrow evening, so if you can just kindly leave me alone for now?” He doesn’t mean to be unkind. They’ve been doing so well with becoming friends again, Louis doesn’t want to mess it up. But he just can’t help but throw all this anger towards Harry just like he’s always done.

“Are you alright Louis?” Harry asks, concern evident in his eyes, every emotion before that wiped away.

“I’m fine.” Louis lies and faces away. He turns back when he doesn’t get a response right away although he knows his answer doesn’t exactly warrant an easy reply. Harry’s face shows frustration and worry all at once. Louis doesn’t understand. “I’m fine.”

“Finished acting like a child yet?” Harry mutters after a moment. Louis shrugs and takes out his pack from his back pocket to get another stick to light. He feels Harry’s presence come closer to him but he doesn’t turn to make sure. The nearness of his voice says it all when, “can I have one?”

“You don’t smoke,” Louis accuses.

“You don’t know that,” Harry retaliates with a shrug. Louis doesn’t give him one so Harry just sighs and steps closer to the ledge where Louis is standing. They don’t speak for a while until Louis finishes the cigarette and he finally asks, “what do you want?”

“I just came here to check if you were alright.”

Louis doesn’t know how he feels about that so he doesn’t respond. Harry takes Louis’ hand in his, cautiously, carefully. Louis looks down at where their fingers intertwine and up to see Harry’s eyes looking at his own. They don’t say a word. They don’t let go either.

 

✿

 

Louis knows his mum was right so he doesn’t stop fighting for Riley but he does understand that Zayn’s right. It’s now all about orchestrating her death and no longer about finding a cure. He hasn’t lost hope but he knows to trust Zayn and the others too.

Through the many different procedures, they manage to get Riley as healthy as she possibly still can be but it’s taken a toll on all of them; everyone coming in more exhausted, more confused, and stuck between hopeful and hopeless. They haven’t told Riley but Louis’ pretty sure she understood.

She turns more and more aggressive everyday. The parents and other kids, not to mention the whole PICU staff, miss her running around the halls or manning the front desk. She gets really grumpy and needy most of the time too. When there isn’t anyone with her for even 5 minutes, the emergency call button is on immediately. They don’t blame her, of course, they know it’s all because of the sickness.

The longer it continues to happen, the more demanding and needy Riley gets, the more they realize she’s just scared. No, not scared,  _ terrified.  _ She just wants someone to be with her always and assure her it’s going to be fine. All the doctors and nurses agree on a compromise wherein Riley will never be left alone, not even for a second.

 

**CHAPTER FOUR**

Harry was taught in medical school that there will come a time that he will cry in a hospital before he even gets the chance to find a place to hide. That’s what he does.

It drains the most out of Louis. He walks in and out of the PICU like a ghost and fakes his smiles around the kids and their families. How he convinces them is beyond Harry, but Louis isn’t fooling him. He notices how far away he seems to get when they hang out during not too busy hours and how he hardly eats when the boys all have lunch together. It worries everyone to the point that they see it necessary to have to force Louis to eat without pushing Louis too much. They hardly win the fights.

When Louis goes missing immediately after his shift his over one afternoon, all the boys are sent to a panic but Harry is the only one who’s free to leave and check his house, so that’s what he does.  _ Thank God he lent me his keys,  _ he remembers on his way there _. _

He finds Louis seated on his bed with a bottle of vodka in his hand. It breaks Harry’s heart.

“Louis,” he says, but he doesn’t get a response. So he walks closer and tries again. “Louis.”

Louis looks at him but says nothing so Harry makes a move to grab the bottle from Louis’ hand and puts it on the bedside table. “Louis, it’s going to be fine,” he tries again. “Please don’t do this to yourself. Don’t give up now.”

This gets to Louis and he hisses, “why the fuck do you care, Harry?”

Harry gets a good look at Louis. His eyes are bloodshot and surrounded by dark circles, his lips are chapped and he looks lifeless himself. Harry breaks even more. “Because I care, Louis. I care about you so let me take care of you.”

“I’m not a child,” he bites back. “I know how to take care of myself.”

“Oh, by drinking? By smoking and hardly eating?” Harry accuses him. He gets down on his knees and looks up to where Louis is on the bed still unmoving. “I get it, okay? I know how hard it is to lose these kids, but sometimes they really just can’t be saved and it’s not your fault.”

Louis cries and Harry holds him until they both fall asleep in each other’s arms.

✿

Riley has about 2 weeks left to live, if their diagnosis is correct, so the whole team makes the most out of it. Louis tries. Harry knows that Louis is trying. He still fools everyone but their small group consisting of the two of them, Niall, Zayn, and Liam, but it doesn’t take much attention on Louis to know he’s very much distraught.

Somehow, they manage to regain Riley’s eyesight. Maybe it’s a blessing, a chance for her to make the most of her last days too. That’s what she does.

She makes a list of things she wants to do before she dies. She fulfills these things with her nurses Niall, Jade, and Leigh-Anne, and her doctors Harry, Louis, Perrie, Zayn, and even Liam who’s grown close to the little girl because of Louis. She learns to paint with Zayn, she goes on a pretend date with Niall because she knows she’ll never get the chance to go on a real one so the staff arranges a nice dinner for them in her room. Harry gives Riley a camera as a present and they take a million pictures of everyone coming into her room and everything they do. They film almost every minute of everyday too. Her parents take long leaves at work to be by her side as much as they can. Louis teaches Riley how to play guitar and they learn one of the songs he’s written--something only Riley, Harry, and him know about--called ‘I Want To Write You A Song’ and she learns it quite as fast for someone so young with so little time in her little hands. They have Harry film the two of them performing it in Riley’s room.

She has a tea party with her ‘girlfriends,’ Perrie, Jade, Leigh, and Jesy, as they call each other. Riley even goes full effort and goes with Louis when he does his rounds one day, just so she can see her friends and meet new friends again, maybe even one last time. She makes everyone smile. She works in the front desk with Jesy one last time too. There’s not much she can do since she can’t go outside and is stuck with an IV on her forearm but they make the most of it.

Harry watches this all unfold in front of him and it takes double the strength to keep going, knowing that one of these days Riley’s not going to keep going anymore.

On one of the days Harry spends most of his time with Riley, he gets cornered into a questioning.

“Do you love Lou?” she asks nonchalantly while tinkering with her camera. She probably doesn’t realize the weight of her question on Harry. He laughs but he know he falls short. Riley’s too smart for skirting around the question or distractions so Harry indulges her.

“Where is this question coming from?” Harry laughs. When Riley seems satisfied with whatever she did with her camera, she lifts it up with a smile, points it at Harry, and answers him. “You look at him the way mom and dad look at each other. So, do you?”

“You want the truth?”

Riley nods excitedly, bouncing up and down her bed.

“I used to. Many years ago. But it didn’t work out. It’s a long story but the short version is, there was a misunderstanding. I thought he left me, he thought I left him. We learned just recently that we both were wrong and that we both left each other,” he explains. “Maybe I still do? Maybe I’ve fallen in love again? I’m not quite sure yet. But he means a lot to me, so that’s that.”

Riley’s smile is huge as she shuts of her camera when Harry stops talking. She only says “you should get married!” before changing the subject, not giving Harry any chance to react.

The next few days is spent by Harry going through operation after operation, with little time left for Riley. He makes sure to pass by before going home, though, and, by home, he means Louis’ flat where Harry’s made himself comfortable ever since the night he came over to a wrecked Louis and spent the night with him. It becomes part of their routine, too. Harry’s not letting Louis out of his sight for as long as they’re in the state of worrying over Riley. He sleeps on the couch every night, just far enough to give Louis space but near enough to be there in case Louis needs him.

✿

No one knows it’s the last day until it happens. It’s a Sunday night.

Riley spends her last day with Louis and Harry, unbeknownst to all of them.

After one of Harry’s surgeries, he makes his way to Riley who’s spent the whole morning with Louis. Louis doesn’t leave when Harry gets there, so it feels just like any other play date as before. The boys sing songs while Riley records everything in her camera, giggling loudly. They’ve still got half a week with Riley, if they’re right, but her joy keeps them hoping. Harry keeps hoping.

It’s been hell for everyone the whole week as they watch Riley deteriorate, the cancer slowly but surely killing her softly. They’ve stopped medication last week. Harry keeps hoping.

It doesn’t last long. 

A classic Disney movie is playing in the background when it happens. Louis and Harry are lying beside Rylie on her bed, one in each of her sides. She has just fallen asleep when the heart monitor falls onto a flat line. When the beeping declines into nothing more than a monotonous hum, Harry knows there is nothing more they can do.

They stand by her bedside. Louis checks the monitors and her pulse while Harry calls for help. He turns back to hear Louis softly announce, “Riley O’Connor. Time of death: January 9th, 21:47.”

They both kiss her forehead before putting up the blanket to cover her body. Harry tries so hard not to cry.

It feels like slow motion. Harry watches as the nurses flood in to help with Riley, but his attention is still centered on Louis, so everything else around them seems to blur out. Harry makes his way to Louis’ side who doesn’t say a word or react any way. And Harry breaks. For Riley, for Louis. Harry cries in the middle of that hospital room, and everyone from Niall to Jade to Leigh to Zayn to Riley’s dad, except Louis, does the same.

They cry around Riley’s bed until she has to be taken away.

Harry has never felt as depressed as he does now. He cries and he cries. Even when everyone has left and it’s only Louis and him in the now Riley-less room. He cries because Louis doesn’t and he  _ knows  _ Louis’ holding back. He cries because there’s nothing else, at least not at the moment.

What gets him back up is realizing what Riley’s last words were. “I love you both,” she had said. “You’re the best doctors in the world.”

He comes home to Louis’ flat that night. They don’t speak. Not at all. They hold each other and maybe that’s enough for now.

✿

Like always, it’s business as usual.

It doesn’t stop in this job. It never stops.  _ Harry  _ can’t stop. Harry can feel the weight of losing Riley get heavier instead of lighter as the days pass by. He feels it in everyone, every time he steps even a single foot inside the PICU. Riley’s been dear to them all. Losing Riley felt like a giant punch in the face. Harry is reminded of her loss in every single thing he comes across. But he can’t just wait until it gets better before he starts working. So that’s what he does. He works and he works. He works because there is nothing else, at least not at the moment.

He spends his nights at Louis’ to make sure he doesn’t break. How Louis still manages to fool everyone with his forced laughter and his ‘I’m fine’s,’ Harry doesn’t understand. They still don’t talk. Not for a few days until:

“Do you think she knew that night? Do you think people know it’s their last day when it’s their last day?” he asks one night while they laid on their respective sides of the bed. The only light in the room is coming from the slight space in between the curtains where the moonlight is peeking through. It casts a light on Louis’ face that makes him look so soft.

Harry started sleeping beside Louis after Riley’s passing when Louis didn’t want to be alone but didn’t know how to communicate it. He ended up pulling Harry into the bedroom late that night and Harry, broken as he was too, didn’t have the heart to say no. Nothing happened, they’re not back to that yet. They haven’t had the chance to work out what they are to each other yet because of their busy lifestyles so they still give each other as much space as possible. Harry misses it though.

Clearing up the mess they’ve made between each other only helped in making Harry miss Louis, miss how they were together. From toddlers to 17-19 year olds, they were inseparable. Or at least they thought they were. But Harry’s always been a big believer of soulmates and destiny and fate, the universe conspiring to get two souls together, so he sees this reunion as a sign. At first he saw it as nothing but a lesson to teach him you can’t run away from your problems, no matter how much distance you manage to put in between, but spending all this time with Louis, fixing whatever they damaged with each other gave him a different perspective. He gets away from his thoughts when he feels Louis nudge his side and he realizes he hasn’t answered the question. Louis asks in a whisper, “are you awake?”

“Nope,” Harry attempts to joke. He looks to Louis who gives him a small smile. That’s an achievement right there. He sighs, looking back up the ceiling, and says, “maybe she’s always known it was going to happen. I still remember when she told you how hard it really was for her. How she supposed her dying would make life easier for everyone. I think they feel it, maybe? Like the gut feeling we have that something will go wrong, maybe. Why do you ask?”

“Her last words were for us,” Louis says. Harry waits for him to say more but he doesn’t. Harry shifts on the bed so that he’s facing Louis. He moves to brush his fingers slightly on Louis’ own, hoping he’ll understand the question it entails.  _ May I? _ Louis fits his hand into Harry’s gigantic ones and squeezes in assurance.  _ You may. _

They fall asleep like that.

It goes on for days and days. Before Harry knows it, a month has passed by since Riley’s death and they’re gathering in one of the family rooms where a small memorial sits for Riley. It’s a tradition for the PICU, with the families’ consents, to lay out small memorials with a framed photo of the child and they can leave messages, flowers, and candles. This time, though, a laptop is placed on the desk beside Riley’s photo. It’s playing a collection of all the things Riley has filmed with her and Harry’s camera. Harry has to keep himself from crying.

Louis doesn’t show up. Not at all. He tells everyone he’s busy but Harry knows he’s just looking for things to do to be busy. He knows Louis doesn’t have much on his plate but he can’t look at this too. At one point, he walks down the family area with Harry and stops by the open door to where Riley’s memorial stood but that’s as much as Harry can do. Louis walks away immediately.

Somehow they end up on the balcony again that night, sitting on a plantbox hand-in-hand. Louis doesn’t smoke. He hasn’t since his birthday. Harry can see the way Louis’ fingers twitch in search for a cigarette to hold but he doesn’t give in. Harry’s proud.

“I couldn’t save her,” Louis says. Harry feels like he hasn’t heard Louis speak for a long time after he does because he’d spent the last few weeks hardly talking to anyone unless it’s a work matter. Harry doesn’t know how to respond so he looks at Louis and squeezes his hands tighter.  _ It’s okay. _

 

 

 

**CHAPTER FIVE**

 

Louis and Harry were taught in medical school that you will not be able to save everyone but that’s just life, and life happens. Life begins somewhere, life ends somewhere; you meet people you will befriend within the first five seconds of meeting, you will meet people you will hate within the first five seconds of meeting, you will laugh so much your stomach will hurt, you will get angry, you will cry so much that you’ll feel empty after, the skies will cry, you will learn, and you will love, and be loved.

The hardest part of all this, Louis thinks, of being a doctor, is that the show goes on.  _ Life _ goes on around you no matter what and you can’t stop just because you’ve lost the will to do what you have to do. You get into this life of being a physician and suddenly a social life is going to require tons of sacrifice just to build up, or family time is so so so limited, or you go through life in a constant state of exhaustion (although, Louis has to admit, most of the time it’s the good kind of tired). You can be going through personal shit yourself but,  _ nope _ , it doesn’t stop. Sickness doesn’t stop for you. The world doesn’t stop for you. You can be in a state of depression and the job still goes on and asks for your full attention, people will still complain and get angry, sick kids will continue to come in through the doors and you’re going to lose your mind and you’re going to want out. But really you don’t, because you love what you do and you just have to accept that no one and nothing is perfect, but it’s okay. You’re doing your job the best you can, and that’s what matters.

This doesn’t stop him from falling for the villains in his head that continue to bring him down.  _ You couldn’t save her. You couldn’t save her. You couldn’t save her. _ He immediately calls himself out for being such a hypocrite.  _ You couldn’t save her. You still  _ love  _ your job when you’re shit at it? You promised her you’d do everything to protect her and look where you are now. She’s gone. She’s gone. She’s gone. _

Louis finally breaks. He doesn’t even think, he just breaks. He’s just gotten back from the hospital, Harry not behind him for the first time in months. He falls on the floor with a sob, tears fighting their way out of his eyes. And he cries. He cries and he cries because there isn’t anything else, at least not right now.

Harry thinks the hardest part is having to accept that you’re only human and you won’t save everyone. It’s losing a patient and having to live with it for the rest of the week, the year, your life. It’s having to get up the next morning like everything’s brilliant and perfect and go on with your job. It’s having to move on as quick as 1, 2, 3, from your failures. It’s knowing so much things in Science and Math and then some, but also knowing there still isn’t much to do with that because you’re not a god, you’re human. It’s accepting that you’ve failed and going about in life with it pushed to the back of your mind. It’s dying on the inside but needing to learn to live through it on the outside in order to help those who are  _ actually  _ dying.

For the first time in a few months, he doesn’t drive home with Louis due to an operation that’s taking longer than it should’ve. When he finally gets rid of the scrubs and leaves the patient in great condition, all procedures having gone perfectly, he makes a mad dash home--er, to Louis’ home, that is.

Louis’s asleep on the floor when Harry walks into the flat. Harry sighs. He doesn’t want to wake the poor thing up but he decides it’ll be better to handle a grumpy Louis than let him spend the night on the floor of the living room. So that’s what he does.

He shakes Louis a couple of times before he fully wakes. When he does, he looks at Harry with glassy heavy eyes rimmed with even darker circles than usual. And he breaks. He sobs into Harry’s arms for the first time since Riley passed away in their arms, and Harry lets him.

“I couldn’t save her,” he says. “I couldn’t save her. I promised but I couldn’t. I failed her. I should’ve never become a doctor.”

And that’s when Harry stops him. He doesn’t know what he’s saying. He’s hurting and he’s putting the blame all on himself. Harry holds him tighter and it feels like hours that they stay on that floor, arms wrapped around each other.  _ Let me save you. _

“Love,” Harry calls Louis’ attention softly. He needs him to separate from the horrible thoughts clouding his head. When Louis doesn’t respond, he tries again. “Lou.”

“Riley’s okay now,” Harry says, and he tries to believe what he’s saying even when talking about Riley breaks him bit by bit as well. “You did what you could. We aren’t gods. We aren’t miracle workers, superheroes. There’s only so much we can do. And you did the most you can and then some. You’ve already managed to let her live longer than she’s expected and that’s not even it. You made her so happy, and in so many ways: by being her doctor, a friend, a brother, a teacher, a father, all rolled in one compact little Lou.”

His joke falls short. He tried. Louis only cries harder.

He was all that, Louis thinks, and he let her down.

Harry gently rubs a hand along Louis’ back to soothe him, or at least he tries to soothe him. “You were there for her every step of the way. You never gave up even when the other doctors would tell you to because you believe in her strength so much. Louis, you did save her in all the ways it was possible to save her.

She would always tell me how important you were to her, how she was so grateful to have you in her life. That kid held a lot of wisdom within her and that’s because of your influence on her. You’re the reason she became so wise and strong and brave through all this, at 7 years old, can you believe it? You gave her a reason to smile everyday, you gave her a chance to be a child even for a little a while. She always told me how you were his favorite person in the whole world. You beat her parents, love.” 

They both laugh. Harry doesn’t hold back the tears anymore and lets them fall down his cheeks. He doesn’t let go of Louis, not for a second. It’s pitiful, Harry thinks, how they’re lying on the floor in each other’s arms, crying and sobbing and laughing all at once, but they don’t think about that.

“You did save her, Louis. I think what most of us forget is that our job isn’t to prolong life or delay death. Our job as doctors is to improve the quality of life,” Harry explains softly. He hears Louis chuckle and looks down to a still tearful Louis, only now there’s a small smile on his face.

“That’s a Patch Adams quote,” he muses. Harry lets out a big laugh.

“It is.”

“Do you really think we did enough?” Louis asks. He takes a big shaky breath and closes his eyes.

“You did more than enough, Lou.”

“But it’s so... Unfair,” he says, voice small and unsure. “What about the ones left? What happens to them? I’ve always wondered… What does it mean to them? What happens next?”

Blue looks straight to green when Louis opens his eyes again. He’s overwhelmed by the amount of uncertainty in Harry’s eyes. But his sincerity overpowers it all when he says, “that’s what we’re going to find out.”

 

✿

 

Louis starts talking again. Everyone’s missed it, Harry can tell. The whole situation didn’t affect the PICU as much as it did Harry and Louis. While it sucked the life out of everyone, most of them were able to snag it right back up. They had to. They really don’t have much of a choice there. But the point is they did it, so Harry knows he can, too. He doesn’t know if Louis can, but they’re getting there.

Harry keeps the distance between the two of them friendly at all times. He has to remind himself it isn’t a good time to talk about  _ them _ . He’ll wait until Louis’ okay, but he’s not leaving Louis’ side no matter what either.

When Louis starts talking again, everyone’s energy seem to rise up. That’s what Louis does. He can get people smiling and laughing until their stomachs hurt without much effort. Harry’s absolutely in love with him. He’s sure now. Niall enjoys Louis’ company and stories again. Zayn is more careful, but the whole gang, the five of them, go back to normal: loud, loud, loud, crazy banter, loud.

Louis heals slowly. It happens like this:

The first sign of improvement is words. He goes to Liam one day and just  _ talks _ . He talks about how he’s feeling, what he’s thinking. They decide, that while Liam is a pediatric psychiatrist, he’s got the knowledge and ability to handle adults, too. Or at least, handle a certain adult named Louis. Louis’s never felt lighter than he does now ever since he started medical school.

He learns not to keep bottling things up. Everyone helps. Hanging out at each other’s flats become a thing among the five. They drink as much as they can (which isn’t a lot. They shouldn’t even be but who’s ever completely followed the rules?) and eat as much as they can (which is a lot because they’re grown men with gigantic appetites).

“As gigantic as Harry’s hands?” Niall laughs after Louis voices out the thought. Everyone follows suit.

“As gigantic as Harry’s giant self, more like it,” Zayn jokes.

“Heyyyyy,” Harry drawls out with a pout. A child trapped in a 30-year-old’s body, really. Louis shakes his head, smiling a bright smile for quite possibly the first time in a while.

The second is acceptance. 3 months After Riley, Louis asks Harry to come see her grave with him. So that’s what they do.

They sit on a blanket in front of her tombstone. “Riley O’Connor,” it reads. “The bravest.”

Louis talks to her like she’s there. And maybe she is. Leaves rustle all around them, the wind hugging them like a friend, and they breathe in nature. Louis doesn’t cry. He almost does but he doesn’t. He smiles instead. He’s learning to accept that maybe this fate was the best thing for his little girl. He talks and he talks and Harry listens. And they know Riley is also listening.

“The PICU is missing you,” Louis says after the two of them sit in silence for a while. He’s run out of stories to tell. He laughs. It feels incomplete without your laughter but I’m glad you’re out of that place, love. You deserve to be free from all of it. I’m so proud of you for all the strength you showed. I hope you’re okay there now, where  _ there _ is. Boobear will always be here.”

The visits become a regular thing too.

The third is action.

He gets diagnosed with depression but he faces all of its’ baggage with a brave face. He feels Riley guide him through every day. He takes a month and a half off of work to rest and prioritize himself. He comes back to the PICU stronger and better than ever.

When he gets back on the job, he meets a lot of new kids. He sees Riley in all of them even if some are only there for a day or two. He remembers what Harry and his mum would always tell him. “Our job is not to delay death but to improve the quality of life. Be there in every way you can be. Help in every way you can help. But you have to remember that you are not going to win sometimes but it’s okay, so long as you make the most out of what you do.” Louis loves his job.

He takes it slowly. Louis takes all the time he needs to heal. He visits his family and it ends in so much happiness that he was too afraid to leave, too afraid that if he does, the happiness ends there. He cleans out his flat and changes up his routine. He takes it little by little and with the help of his friends and the people he loves, he gets by.

A year After Riley, her family comes to the PICU for a small gathering with the staff that helped them through everything. Louis doesn’t hide. He walks into the room like the sun and provides everyone with warmth and a reminder.  _ It’s okay now. She’s okay. _ They share stories and reminisce. Some shed tears but it’s okay. In the end, Louis makes sure what they take home that day is how strong Riley was. He makes sure their last memory ot simply thought of her for a while would be how bravely she fought her way through life and her illness, and how she remained such a huge ball of sunshine through everything.

He still breaks, Louis. He still falls into the darkness in his head sometimes but Harry is always there. Harry isn’t the answer to all of this, they both know that, but Harry doesn’t leave. Not again. But they know that sometimes, you just really need an anchor, someone to keep you grounded; sometimes you just really need someone there to remind you it’s okay.

They talk about it more. They talk about the missing pieces from when they weren’t a part of the other’s life. They share so much laughter and food and hugs and everything else.

“Can I ask you something?” Harry says one day, pulling Louis in closer and kissing his forehead gently. Louis hums in response.

“Lou,” he says, scratching Louis’ head. “Will you give me the chance to make this right again?”

Louis moves away and looks at him like he’s crazy. “Isn’t that what we’ve been doing all along?”

“Is it?”

“Mhmm.”

They smile at each other and hold it like that for a moment. Green to blue, blue to green.

“Then, Lou,” Harry starts with a big grin painted across his face. “Will you be mine again?”

“Isn’t that what I’ve been all along? Yours?” Louis questions.

“I just need to make sure we’re on the same page,” Harry defends and Louis laughs. He tells Harry it’s okay. But Harry needs to make sure so he asks again, “are you ready for more changes in your life?”

“You’ve been here for a while, I think I’m way past getting used to it.”

Harry hasn’t kissed Louis since he was seventeen and Louis was nineteen. Their last kiss was shared the day before they fell out. Harry missed it so much, he didn’t want to stop the moment their lips met.

He’s always known it meant something when he walked into the PICU doors his first day at St. Anne’s and found himself face to face with Louis. He’s always believed that there’s a reason they found their way back to each other. He didn’t know it was going to be this: Louis in his arms in Louis’ flat that they now share, Louis in his arms when they go to sleep on the same bed, Louis mouth on his again.

Louis says it first. “I love you. Again, I think. Or maybe, still. Maybe I haven’t really stopped.”

“And I’m in love with you. Again, maybe. Still, maybe. What matters is now.”

“I don’t want to sound cheesy and lame but you saved me, or at least you helped me get to where I am now, so thank you.”  


Maybe that night ends with clothes strewn about all over the floor on the way to the bedroom, lights off, and love echoing off the walls, but no one has to know about that. 

**Author's Note:**

> that ending probably sucked....... i'm sorry. i'd probably edit this again in the future lol.
> 
> pls send me constructive criticism or like just comments if you liked the fic. i'd really appreciate it!!
> 
> thank you so much for reading. hope you have a great day! *hugs*
> 
> xx


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